The Philadelphia Police, Past and Present

https://archive.org/stream/cu31924068919533#page/n7/mode/2up

 

 

Present, that is, if you live in 1887 or thereabouts. This is a comprehensive 892-page account of the department from its founding by Penn through the Consolidation and beyond, up to 1887 anyway. The Free Library Central Branch  has a reprint from 1974 in the  Social Science and History Department, classified as "Closed Reference." That just means it doesn't circulate and it's not on the shelves. You have to ask for it.

Here's a nice searchable online version from Archive.org, with all the illustrations and pictures. This is text version.
 
In it you'll find such interesting tidbits as:

William Penn went back to England and ran the Commonwealth from there for 17 years. In 1697 he wrote a letter to the governor:

"The Council were informed in plain terms that reports and accusations, tending to ruin and disgrace, had reached England, and among other things, that they had not only countenanced but actually encouraged piracy. In regard to Philadelphia, it had been reported that there was "no place more overcome with wickedness, sins so scandalous, openly committed, in defiance of law and virtue, and, in short, actions of so bad a nature that modesty forbade their recital."
The first Chief of Detectives was Joseph Wood 1859 who organized the new department, and he did a bang-up job catching crooks. "It was not long before it came to be considered that Philadelphia was a good place 'to keep away from,' among professional criminals."
 
"During Chief Wood's term of office he made a number of important arrests and secured the conviction of many notorious offenders. Among them was James Buchanan Cross, the forger, who was sentenced to five years' imprisonment. Cross was one of the most celebrated and expert forgers of his time."

Wood was a hands-on kind of chief:
 
"Probably the most important criminal event in which Mr. Wood had a hand while chief of detectives was the "turning up," arrest and conviction of a gang of counterfeiters. They were acknowledged to be the most expert of that day, and even the banks were imposed upon by their spurious notes. Those arrested and sentenced to the penitentiary were "Bill" Cregar and " Bob" Bridley, who were arrested by Chief Wood personally, and on each of whom he found $300 of the counterfeit notes; "Si" Bright and Manassas, or "Minnie" Price, as he was called. Six thousand dollars of counterfeit notes on the Western Bank  were captured at "Minnie" Price's tavern, Nineteenth and Perkiomen streets, which was used as headquarters for the gang. Each of these men was sentenced to five years' imprisonment." 

Wood instituted the Rogues' Gallery, a Philadelphia's Most Wanted List, 1884's collection seen below.